


earth laughs in flowers

by starksnack



Series: the workshop [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Flowers, Fluff, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Language of Flowers, Love Confessions, M/M, POV Tony Stark, Post-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Secret Admirer, Slice of Life, Tony Stark Bingo 2020, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, anonymous confessions, just all around happy, like a lot of it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:35:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23237803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starksnack/pseuds/starksnack
Summary: A secret admirer has been sending Tony flowers and confessions of love.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Series: the workshop [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1610872
Comments: 28
Kudos: 341
Collections: Tony Stark Bingo 2020





	earth laughs in flowers

**Author's Note:**

> For my square Anonymous Confessions in the Tony Stark Bingo.  
> Special thanks to FeyRelay on Discord for beta-ing this for me.

Tony is absolutely exhausted as he stumbles into the office on a quiet Monday morning. Despite the early hour, the commute downtown hadn’t been too bad and Happy had told him a whole host of so-called ‘dad jokes’ while they were sitting in the minimal traffic. 

Walking into the building, Tony lets out a deep sigh. He’s on his second cup of coffee, the liquid warming his fingers through the metal of the tumbler he’s clutching in his hands like a lifeline. After the last couple of days of late-nights in the lab, there’s nothing he wants more than to bury himself in his sheets and sleep for a thousand years; however, there’s no rest for the wicked.

Plastering on his warmest smile, Tony waves at the receptionist, a tall Pepper-approved guy named Luke who’s no-nonsense, especially when he sees Tony trying to escape the building to his lab at home. Now, though, Luke’s face lights up at the sight of Tony and immediately waves him over.

“Mornin’,” Tony smiles, slipping his phone into his pocket to give the man his full attention. He can look at his tear-inducing schedule later. And if he just so happens to be fashionably late to his first meeting ‘cause he was having a conversation with the receptionist, then  _ c’est la vie. _

“Sorry to bother you Mr. Stark, but this came in for you today.” Luke turns around, grabbing a large arrangement of flowers to set on the counter. He smiles warmly at Tony, all straight white teeth as he pushes the glass vase across the counter toward him.

It’s a large arrangement of fragrant carnations and peonies in various shades of red and pink. Tony has to stand on the tips of his toes to smell them over the counter and a rosy blush dusts across his cheeks. They’re all just budding, green swelling into pretty bursts of romantic colours. A silky gold ribbon is tied around the glass vase, a note hanging from the string.

“Thank you,” Tony says, his fingers running down the glass of the vase. He knows he’s looking at the flowers with unadulterated awe but he can’t help himself.

Usually, the mail Tony gets is less than flattering. He’s no stranger to the hate mail people tend to send them; it’s impossible to please an entire company and even harder to keep the entire world happy. He tries his best with the Avengers, but people have long memories. Delight settles in Tony’s chest as he runs a finger across a soft petal, surprised happiness open in his features.

Luke grins at him before turning his attention to the flowers. “The carnations represent fascination and the peonies are for beauty. Looks like you have a secret admirer, Mr. Stark.”

Pleasure blooms in Tony’s chest and he resists the urge to clutch the flowers close and never let go. With a little rearranging Tony is able to pick up the bouquet without setting down his beloved coffee, an accomplishment in and of itself. He thanks Luke before heading across the lobby toward the elevators, his nose ducking down to take a long whiff of the flowers.

Tony doesn’t have a free hand to hit the elevator call button but thankfully the staccato sound of heels is echoing through the lobby, which can only mean one thing.

“Hey, Pepper!”

The redhead checks her watch, brows pulled down in disapproval as she notes that Tony is supposed to be in a meeting right now. Jabbing the button, she turns her unimpressed gaze on him before her expression melts into a fond smile.

“Don’t make that face at me, you know I can’t be mad at you.”

Tony quirks an eyebrow up at her as they step into the elevator together. “What face? I’m not making a face, this is my normal face.”

Rolling her eyes, Pepper hits the button for the floor to Tony’s office and then the one for the meeting room. “I’ll leave the flowers on your desk, go to your meeting.”

Unwilling to risk a high heel to the more delicate parts of his body, Tony reluctantly relinquishes his grip on the vase, passing the bouquet to her. He loses the rest of the day to meetings, trying to remind himself that he likes to get them out of the way all at once so he can spend the rest of the week with his minions in R&D, laughing and joking and learning.

In his absolute exhaustion, Tony forgets all about the flowers until the next day when a second bouquet of beautiful tulips and orchids shows up for him at the receptionist’s desk. Luke passes them over the counter to him with a fond smile and Tony’s face lights up as he buries his nose in them taking a deep inhale. Jarvis says the tulips are for perfection and the orchards are for luxury, a perfect description for Tony through-and-through. Well,  _ Jarvis _ hadn’t said that, but Tony is allowed to editorialize; they’re his own damn flowers.

Unfortunately, he has to rush to respond to an Avengers alarm — Loki causing terror in Central Park — and has to ask Luke to arrange for the flowers to be brought up to his office while he’s busy suiting up. They take him down pretty quickly and for the rest of the day, Tony thinks about soft petals and the fragrant scent of the beautiful flowers.

Wednesday brings joyous yellow alstroemerias and chrysanthemums tied with a bright red bow. They’re a comforting declaration of support and joy that makes Tony happy from the inside out as he buries his face in the bright petals and leaves.

That’s when Tony remembers that there had been a card attached to the first bouquet and for the first time in what feels like forever, Tony skips the floor for research and development and goes to his private office.

The windows are open overlooking Manhattan as the sun is just rising in the sky. The vases are lined up like sentries against the back cabinet of his office, flowering beautifully in the early morning light.

Untying the silky bow on the first vase, Tony pulls open the card. Eyes skimming over the neat familiar cursive as his heart flutters in his chest.

_ Tony, _

_ Every day my heart grows fonder, _

_ Devotion lasts longer, _

_ My love grows stronger. _

_ Your secret admirer _

No one has ever written Tony a poem before. Especially not one containing such an astonishingly poetic declaration of pure love. The words bounce around his brain, fluttering around like a million butterflies as he tries to calm his racing heart.

Warmth fills his chest as his cheeks redden a little bit more. Desperate for more of the beautiful words, Tony goes to the other two bouquets, looking through them for other cards.

Triumphantly, Tony pulls a gold card from between the tulips and orchids, flipping it open and reading through it, falling into his desk chair as the words hit him in the chest, squeezing delightfully around his heart. The smile on his face is wide and he feels like he’s on top of the world.

_ Tony, _

_ Looking into your beautiful eyes, _

_ My heart flips and soars _

_ My chest fills with butterflies, _

_ Happiness, your laugh restores _

_ Your secret admirer _

There should be a third card in the last bouquet of flowers, but Tony doesn’t think his weak heart can take much more of the palpitations that come with the sheer joy of knowing that he has a secret admirer. This is unprecedented in the best kind of way.

A knock on the door of his office has Tony scrambling to tuck the cards into his desk and wipe the ridiculously wide smile off his face. He takes a deep breath, trying to calm his racing heart before calling out that the door is open.

Pepper steps in with a wide smile, a couple of folders tucked under her arm. “It was weird hearing from Jarvis that you were in your office. Are you feeling okay? What are you doing up here?”

“Just admiring the flowers,” Tony tells her as he looks back at them, happiness bouncing in his chest as he thinks about someone out there in the world buying him flowers and taking the time to write him loving poems. He looks down at his toes as embarrassment blooms pink and rosy across his cheeks. “I’ve never had a secret admirer before.”

Pepper smiles kindly at him, setting the folders on his desk. “I have some papers for you to read through and sign here and Steve came by with his mission report for you to sign off on since you refuse to write your own.”

Tony laughs, immediately deciding that the folder will be put off until after he sees his babies in R&D. “I mean, I’m so busy running a multi-billion dollar company in my spare time, I don’t really have time to sit down and write my own mission reports.”

Rolling her eyes, Pepper meaningfully sets a pen on top of the folder giving him no excuse to avoid the paperwork like he was notorious for. “I want these done by the end of the week please.” And the look she gives him promises dire consequences if he doesn’t follow through so he nods at her with a promise. He’ll look at them later, probably.

The folder sits on his table, ignored until the next day when he’s back in his office with a fourth bouquet of flowers. This one is gladioluses for strength and sunflowers declaring adoration and Tony is starting to notice the red and yellow pattern of the bouquets that make him blush something fierce. Clearly, his secret admirer is taking the time to pick his flower choices with great care.

Before Tony can go digging for the two notes he has yet to read, Pepper is there dragging him off to an emergency meeting regarding insider trading that he has to handle immediately because apparently arrests need to be made. He doesn’t know who would be stupid enough to do something as dumb as using company knowledge for stock market purchases, but Tony thinks that kind of stupidity deserves jail time.

He’d like to say he’s grumpy because of the bad PR this is going to generate for Stark Industries, but  _ really _ he’s annoyed that he has to wait even longer to read the notes that are tucked away in the beautiful bouquets waiting for him in his office. He wants to carry the vases with him everywhere and bask in the beauty of the flowers, but instead, he’s barely had a collective hour in his office this week to admire them.

Much to Tony’s dismay, the meeting goes well into the night despite Pepper’s attempts to move things along faster. Tony is sleepy and cranky by the end, sitting at the head of the table and trying not to fall asleep as Pepper administers orders. A company notice needs to go out regarding the stock market and the media has a field day ahead of them but somehow Tony comes out relatively unscathed, though he can’t wait to crawl into bed.

When Tony stumbles into the building on Friday morning, absolutely exhausted, he immediately lights up when he sees Luke, a Pavlovian response at the idea of more flowers and another note. He has three to read now. That might be a great start to his morning. It’s Friday so he has his lunch hour blocked out for team leader bonding with Steve and he’s so excited to see his friend. It’s been such a bad week save for the flowers and Tony can’t wait to just vent over the best italian food in the city.

“Here you go!” Luke passes him the bouquet with a smile.

Tony looks over the vase with a smile, reaching up to smooth a finger over the silk bow. Curiousity sparks across his lips and he turns to Luke. He doubts that they were delivered by a company considering they have all been in glass vases, so it’s likely that his secret admirer came in before he did and dropped the flowers off with Luke personally. “Do you know who these are from?”

The corners of Luke’s mouth twitch and he glances away from Tony and back, his eyes sparkling. “Maybe, but I was sworn to secrecy.”

“Do I know them?” Tony asks, pulling the flowers toward his chest. Today’s bouquet is a beautiful arrangement of red roses, white gardenias, and blue hydrangeas. It’s weird that the flowers are red, white, and blue today instead of their usual red and yellow but Tony pays it no heed, fingers searching for the card that usually accompanies the flowers.

“Yeah, you know him,” Luke admits and Tony catches on to the pronoun like a dog with a bone. He could ask Jarvis to check the security feeds and be done with it, but Tony kind of loves the not knowing and the accompanying curiosity. He wants to feel like he’s earned his secret admirer’s name and that’s going to require some detective work.

Maybe someone on his team in R&D or someone he had met at a gala? The handwriting is familiar, so it was probably more likely someone who knows him from work. Probably not a shareholder or board member. Someone at SHIELD perhaps? The idea of Fury sending him pretty flowers has Tony snorting to himself as he hefts the flowers into his arms.

Wishing Luke a good day, Tony heads to the elevator hitting the button for the penthouse and stepping into the glass cabin to slump against the wall. The flowers are surprisingly heavy and Tony loves the weight against his chest.

“What do  _ these _ flowers represent, Jarvis?” Tony asks, ducking his nose into the bouquet to smell them. Tony has started to associate the fragrance of flowers with the butterflies fluttering in his stomach and the idea brings joy to his face.

“The roses are for devotion, the gardenias for hope and the hydrangeas for togetherness.” Jarvis’ voice sounds in the quiet of the elevator.

_ Togetherness. _ Tony likes the sound of that. It reminds him of past promises that warm his heart. Maybe, just maybe, he does know who the flowers are from.

Setting the flowers down on the back counter, Tony sits down at his desk and pulls Pepper’s stack of paperwork toward him. They smell vaguely like her perfume and he flips open the cover as he uncaps the pen. He trusts that she’s already read through all of them so all he really has to do is put his signature on the bottom.

With half the stack done hours later, he’s contemplating ordering a stamp of his signature or paying someone to forge it for him despite the possible evil villain repercussions. The sun is high in the sky over the city of Manhattan, glittering off the windows of high rises and bathing Tony’s office in a bright glow.

Sitting back in his chair, Tony decides to flip to Steve’s report so he can at least hand it back to the captain over lunch. Reading through it, Tony smiles at the way Steve seems to praise some of his decisions, even when he had gone back on some of Steve’s direct orders. Sure they often fought about Tony’s insubordination in the field, but when it came to their superiors, Steve always had his back.

Signing off on the report, Tony leans back in his chair. Steve is the only Avenger who handwrites his reports, choosing to live in the past instead of typing his reports as emails or recording them and having Jarvis transcribe them. It’s kind of charming, all things considered, despite the fact that the two of them consistently argue about technology.

Tony still has half an hour before Steve swings by to pick him up for lunch. That should be more than enough time to read the last three notes from the bouquets. Untying the silk ribbons around the vases to free the notes, Tony settles into his desk chair, excitement thrumming through his veins.

_ Tony, _

_ Roses are red, _

_ Violets are blue, _

_ This poem is cliché, _

_ But I adore you. _

_ Your secret admirer _

Tony snorts, glee pulling his cheeks into a smile. So his secret admirer has a sense of humour. Tony loves that. He can’t wait to figure out who it is so he can crack ridiculous jokes with him.

The curl of the ‘y’ tugs at his heart, achingly familiar. He knows this handwriting like he knows the back of his hand. It’s like an intimate hug, the penmanship, and Tony feels like each note is a sweet kiss.

Pulling open the next note, he reads through it.

_ Tony, _

_ Your eyes _

_ Your laugh _

_ Your incredible smile _

_ There’s so much to love about you _

_ And so little time _

_ Your secret admirer _

Tony’s eyes fall on the mission report still open on his desk. The curl of the ‘y’ is the same. The handwriting is the same. The care with which Steve writes his name is the same because  _ his secret admirer is Steve _ and… Tony doesn’t know how to process that information.

With shaking hands, he opens the last note. Eyes skimming over it before slowing down and reading it again, disbelieving. This is everything Tony has ever wanted.

_ Tony, _

_ I would love to take you out sometime if you’ll have me. _

_ Lunch? _

_ Yours, Steve Rogers. _

There’s a knock on the door. It’s noon, so it can’t be anyone but Steve. Standing up, Tony races to the door, nearly taking his hip out with the side of his desk. Excitement and anticipation rush fast and heady through his veins as he pulls the door open, clearly startling Steve… who’s waiting on the other side holding a large bouquet of flowers.

“I love you too,” Tony whispers breathlessly.

Steve’s wide smile in response is far more beautiful than any flowers.

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from Hamatreya by Ralph Waldo Emerson.


End file.
